Coauthors Cullen S. Hendrix and Marcus Noland presented the findings of their new book from the Peterson Institute, Confronting the Curse: The Economics and Geopolitics of Natural Resource Governance, on June 4, 2014.

Instead of success and prosperity, producers of diamonds, gold, oil, and other commodities—many in the least developed parts of Africa and Asia—often remain mired in poverty and plagued by economic mismanagement, political authoritarianism, foreign exploitation, and violent conflict. The condition is captured in the phrase "the resource curse." Coauthors Hendrix and Noland review recent developments as poor countries struggle to avoid the resource curse but fall too often into that trap. They call for support for international efforts to encourage greater transparency and improved management of natural resource wealth and for new partnerships between the West and the developing world to confront the curse.